RSA: Local Films show an increase in revenue at the Box Office

On 8 August 2014, the National Film and Video Foundation (nfvf) has released its South African Box Office Report for the first half of the year. The report shows that local productions generated R33 million in revenue, up 43% from the same period in 2013 which generated R23 million. Foreign gross revenue however declined by 10% from R385 million to R348 million, and the total gross revenue fell by 6% from R408 million to R382 million.

A total of 111 films were released at the box office between 3 January and 28 June, 12 of those were local films. Films that performed well at the Box Office included Amazing Spider Man 2 which earned R21.8 million, followed by Rio 2 (R21.1 million) and X-Men: Days of Future Past with box office takings of R16.9 million. Pad Na Jou Hart was the local film which performed the best in the period under review, receiving over R11 million in gross revenue.

Times Media (formerly Nu Metro) and Ster Kinekor had the largest market share gaining 46% and 36% respectively. This was followed by United International Pictures with 13% and Crystal Brook 5%. Indigenous Film Distributors received 1% of the market share however they distributed 5 of the 12 local films. Ster Kinekor distributed 4 while Times Media and United International Pictures distributed 2 and 1 respectively.

In terms of earnings by genre, Animation was the highest grossing genre with R72 million. In the second place was Action/Adventure grossing R70 million and Drama took the third place with R59 million. Observing the same period last year, Action, Animation and Action/Adventure were the top grossing genres. These are the top three genres that seem to be mostly enjoyed by the audience at the moment and have earned fairly well at the box office.

The report also revealed that there is some correlation with the number of prints at release and gross revenue. Pad Na Jou Hart which received the highest revenue also received the largest number of prints. Elelwani and the Forgotten Kingdom which received the lowest revenue also received the lowest number of prints at release. Thus indicating films with more prints are more likely to generate higher revenue.